


On Glass and on Gold

by krityan



Category: Alan Wake (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-19
Updated: 2010-12-19
Packaged: 2017-10-13 18:48:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/140514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/krityan/pseuds/krityan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Anderson brothers begin to learn about the Darkness, in their own way. Warnings for profanity and spoilers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On Glass and on Gold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ashurbadaktu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ashurbadaktu/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide! I'm always glad to add to the Alan Wake fanbase, as it is a beautiful story with so much depth hidden between the cracks just waiting to be explored.  
> I'll admit I had a little trouble with your prompt, since the line between what really had a basis in reality and what was created by Alan in writing "Departure" was pretty fuzzy, and the Anderson brothers are some of the most mixed-in. Finding the lyrics to their songs in the manuscript pages was one of my more jaw-dropping "Oh man, what is even _real_ anymore!" moments in the game. Nonetheless, I've done my best and hope you enjoy!  
>  -Title from The Poetic Edda

It was rarely quiet on the Anderson Farm, as most occasions called for raucous parties with the whole band in tow. If those parties lasted for a week? All the better. This batch of moonshine, though? This batch deserved a fucking medal for the way it had both brothers laid out on their asses.  
Odin woke up first, hauling himself onto the couch and upsetting his pet birds (who had made themselves relatively comfortable on the back of the tattered piece of furniture.)  
"Hey, hey. Did we do something different this time? Because my head, man! There was some serious one with the universe hippie shit going on!" He waited a beat for a response, then immediately lost his patience with waiting, "Tor! Man. Come on." He kicked at his brother, still lying prone on the floor. "Get up, I'm talking at you."  
His brother grumbled, rolling over and out of reach of Odin's boot, "Back off. I'm trying to have a hangover here, right?"  
"This is the best shit we have ever brewed and I want to talk about it, so get up."  
It would have bordered on whining from anyone else, but Odin had a way of insisting. Tor gave him that.  
" _Fine._ " Tor pushed himself upright, wobbling for a minute before finding stability in the coffee table and transferring himself, with a complete lack of grace and ceremony to the couch across from Odin. "Alright, then. Why did I have to move today? 'Cause things were feeling a lot more awesome while I was on the floor."  
"Yeah, yeah. I don't care how sick you're about to be, just help me figure out how we made this shit suddenly so awesome."  
"Shit. I don't know? The lake water? Maybe it's radioactive and messing with our heads or something."  
"That's why we filter that shit. It's filled with deer piss and dead raccoons."  
"Yeah, well I was lazy and carrying lake water around is heavy, alright?"  
"Ah, fuck you." Odin feinted a swing at his brother's head, a half-hearted gesture given that the other man was about six feet away on a different couch, then collapsed back onto the couch in a defeated slump. "That shit gave me the craziest dreams, though! Kept dreaming about the lake."  
"Yeah, man. It was like the stuff Tom was always talking about, like, the depths and the shores and the shit like that. And there was this woman..."  
"Looked like Barbara, right?"  
"Shit, man! So we were having the same dream? That's one crazy trip, man." Tor rubbed his forehead briefly, before planting his face in his hands in an attempt to smother his eyes and, by proxy, his headache. "Fucking Barbara, man. What did Tom ever see there? We could've found him all kinds of girls, and at least a couple of 'um wouldn't have been that crazy."  
"What a hag she was." The birds had returned, giving a certain weight to Odin's generally meaningless words. Memory nudged at the man's ear, Thought stared into the distance. They gave Tor the creeps, but he'd stopped questioning his brother when Odin promised to do the same years ago.  
"Gave me nightmares. Don't need her coming up when I'm trying to have a good time. Talking about doors and shit."  
"Want to go down there?"  
"Where? The lake? Not right now I don't. Too damn early, anyway. I need some fucking coffee, and a real night of sleep. Then you ask me and I'll still probably tell you no."  
"Fine! We go to the diner, my treat. Then you go to the lake with me. Maybe it's a sign or something, I don't know. Worst case we sit there and drink a lot of beer until we forget the whole damn thing."  
"Fine. But only because otherwise you'll let the birds crap in my bed again."  
Odin laughed, as the ravens spread their wings and mixed their voices with his, "Yeah, probably would have. Come on, I need some fucking breakfast."  
\---  
They were kicked out of the Oh Deer Diner in what they considered personal record time. They did, at least, get their coffee (having taken the mugs with them on their way out the door. Best coffee in town, collection of little beige mugs at home to prove it.) One stop later, and they were on the way to Cauldron Lake, back of the truck loaded up with 2 cases of the cheapest beer available in preparation for Plan B's inevitable trigger.  
They'd been hollering along with the radio shamelessly since they left the farm, but fell into an uncomfortable silence as the lake came into view. It was a sizable body of water, almost exactly what you'd expect to find in the leftover waste of a volcanic explosion. It was exactly as if God had turned a mountain upside down, filled with water and left it behind to get swallowed up by the woods.  
It only seemed all the more vast with the absence of Diver's Isle. The Anderson brothers hadn't been exactly close to Tom, but they knew him well enough to picture his cabin here and stare at the absence.  
Tor kicked his feet up onto the dashboard and pushed beyond the solemn moment for his own benefit as much as his brother's, "Well, I came to the lake. There it is, and I don't see any ladies, doors or any other freak shows. So, next step we get drunk and forget about it. Drain the tanks of 'shine for good measure, because there is something seriously wrong with that batch. Lead poisoning, alcohol poisoning, or whatever."  
"Whatever, man." Odin's face remained serious, his one eye fixated on the spot where Bird Leg cabin had sunk into the lake. "It's gotta mean something, though. Us having the same dream and all. Dreaming about the lake and Tom like that."  
"'70 was a long time ago, man. Bad booze bringing back bad memories, you know?"  
"Yeah."  
"Shit, man. And you don't wanna piss off Tom's ghost or something. He'll rewrite all our songs while we're sleeping or something. End up singing power ballads about clouds or something."  
"Fuck that."  
"Yeah, man. Fuck that!" Tor laughed, and clapped Odin on the shoulder, "Let's fucking party! Forget that heavy shit already!"  
Odin responded with laughter of his own, although it was a little more hesitant. "Yeah, we'll party with Tom tonight. Poor bastard never did get to see what it was really like to be a rock star!"


End file.
